How schools in Colorado discipline youngest students

Young black boys are suspended at disproportionate rates in school districts across Colorado. Some rural districts have the highest early childhood suspension rates in the state. And despite nationwide debate about the impact of harsh discipline on young children and local efforts to bring the numbers down, suspensions in the early grades actually are going up.

These are a few of the findings from a new Chalkbeat analysis of three years of data on out-of-school suspensions given to students in kindergarten through second grade. Chalkbeat obtained the districtand state-level data from the Colorado Department of Education through a public records request.

More suspensions

Last year, districts statewide gave approximately three suspensions per 100 students in kindergarten through second grade, up from 2.6 in 2014-15. The state education department first began disaggregating suspension data by grade level three years ago. per 100 students.

Meanwhile, about 70 rural districts suspended no students at all last year. These include East Grand, Weld RE-9 and Telluride.

High rates in El Paso County

Three of the large districts that used suspension in lower elementary grades most often last year are in El Paso County: Harrison, Colorado Springs and Widefield. One of the other two is in metro Denver, and the other is in Greeley.

The three El Paso County districts have larger proportions of students from low-income families than some of their lower-suspending counterparts in that county — Falcon or Academy, for instance. However, other large districts, including Denver and Aurora, serve similar or greater proportions of students in poverty as the high-suspending El Paso County districts, yet have lower suspension rates.

Fewer in affluent, white large districts

climbing in the state’s other four largest districts. Of Colorado’s five largest districts, which educate about 75,000 students in kindergarten through second grade, Jeffco had the highest rate of early elementary suspensions last year, followed by Aurora. Each district recently embarked on new efforts to prevent student suspensions.

State suspends more young black boys

Young black boys are disproportionately suspended nationwide. Colorado is no exception. While black boys make up up only about 2.3 percent of the state’s kindergarten to secondgrade students, they receive almost 10 percent of suspensions given in that age group.

Such disparities exist in all 14 of the state’s 30 largest districts for which data was available.